The Global Alliance for Wild Cats is an international coalition of the world’s leading environmental philanthropists who share an extraordinary vision to preserve large-scale wildlife habitat and biodiversity around the globe by protecting the world’s wild cats.

Formed in 2014 under the auspices of His Highness, Mohamed Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, the Global Alliance includes members from China, India, Saudi Arabia and the United States who have together committed $100 million—the cornerstone of a $200 million campaign to save the world’s wild cats.

The Global Alliance was conceived by Dr. Thomas S. Kaplan, Panthera’s Founder and Chairman of the Board, and his wife, Daphne Recanati Kaplan. It provides critical support to Panthera and the NGOs with whom it partners for the development and implementation of science-based solutions that address the primary threats facing big cats: poaching for the illegal wildlife trade, human-cat conflict, loss of prey species, and the loss and fragmentation of habitat.

Among the initiatives that the Global Alliance is funding are: the stabilization and recovery of critically endangered tiger populations in Asia, expansion of anti-poaching units and world-class site security strategies to protect Africa’s lions, leopards, and cheetahs, development and implementation of a comprehensive snow leopard conservation program, and the preservation of the 5,000 mile Jaguar Corridor in Latin America, one of the most ambitious conservation projects in the world.

In June of 2019, Saudi Arabia’s Royal Commission for AlUla (RCU) joined the Alliance with a commitment to invest $US 20 million over the next 10 years to conservation measures, focusing on the critically endangered Arabian leopard and leopard populations around the globe. These efforts, led by HH Prince Badr bin Abdullah Al-Saud, include establishing a global fund to support the future of this rare big cat species.

Panthera is the gold standard in big cat conservation. It has the proven capacity and expertise to implement this all-important global effort to save the most charismatic members of the animal kingdom.